Six athletes were inducted into the 2016 Metro Schools Sports Hall of Fame on April 12. We applaud their achievements in athletics, in business and service to others, and we thank them for years of inspiration and motivation.

They have each earned a place in Nashville history, and we proudly celebrate them:

Richard Harmon “Dick” Fulton, East High School Class of 1945

Richard Fulton’s illustrious record of service to the city of Nashville makes him one of the most respected and revered men in the city’s history. Mr. Fulton served in the State Senate from 1957 to 61; six terms as a United States Congressman from 1963 to 1975; and three terms as Mayor of Metro Nashville from 1975 to 1987. At East High School, he was a football star. Fulton excelled on the Eagles’ frontline on offense and defense.

Fulton was named All-City by the Tennessean in 1943 and 1944, All-City by the Nashville Banner in 1944, All-State and AllSouth his senior year and was one of the city’s best linemen of the decade. After graduating from East in January of 1945, he served on a Navy destroyer near the end of World War II and returned to play college football for General Neyland at the University of Tennessee.

Fulton was called to politics in 1952, won a State Senate seat in the 1950s and was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in the 1960s. He served twelve years in Congress before returning to Nashville to serve as Mayor. His courage and visionary approach, while tirelessly exercising an uncommon dedication to detail, remain a shining example to all elected officials.

Les Hunter, Pearl High School Class of 1960

Les “Big Game” Hunter attended Pearl High with teammate Vic Rouse. They were a powerhouse combination on a Pearl team that carried a 54-game winning streak and won national championships in 1958, 1959 and 1960. After his success at Pearl, Hunter attended Loyola University in Chicago.

At Loyola, he served as the starting center of the team that upset the University of Cincinnati in overtime to win the 1963 NCAA Men’s Division I Basketball Championship. He and the other four starters played the entire game. Another milestone at Loyola was a first-round Mideast Regional victory by Hunter and the Ramblers over Tennessee Tech.

They won 111-42, a score that remains a record margin of victory for an NCAA men’s basketball game. Hunter was drafted by the Detroit Pistons in the second round of the 1964 NBA draft. He played for one season in the NBA with the Baltimore Bullets and 6 seasons in the ABA with the Minnesota Muskies, Miami Floridian, New Jersey Nets, Kentucky Colonels and the Memphis Tams. Hunter scored 5,735 points in his professional career and was a two time ABA All-Star.

After retiring from basketball, Hunter moved to Kansas City in 1976. He owned a restaurant for 10 years and now works as an instructor helping students who did not graduate take online classes to complete high school. On July 11, 2013, Hunter and former Loyola teammates John Egan, Jerry Harkness and Ron Miller met with President Barack Obama in the Oval Office to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the school’s 1963 national championship. To date, that championship remains the only NCAA Division I basketball championship won by a university from the state of Illinois.

In September 2013, the entire ’63 Loyola Ramblers team was inducted into the Chicagoland Sports Hall of Fame. That same November, the 1963 Loyola Ramblers were also the first team to be inducted into the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame.

Brenda Thompson Lawrence, Stratford High School Class of 1969

Brenda Lawrence graduated from Stratford High School in 1969 with numerous accomplishments, including BETA Club and Miss Stratford. A standout on the court, she was named All-City in 1967-68 and 1968-69, All-Metro in 1967-68 and 1968-69, MVP of the Nashville Interscholastic League (NIL) in 1969, All State in 1969 and a member of the East-West AllStar Game in the summer of 1969. She averaged 37 points each game in 1969, achieved the highest points scored – 54 points against Madison in 1968-69, and most free throws in a game at 25. During the summer of 1971, Lawrence toured Europe with the UT Singers. In 1972 and 1973, she attended Oral Roberts University, where she played basketball, was on the men’s tennis team and was the leader in Youth for Christ. I

n 1974, Lawrence was named Miss Belmont and first runner-up to Miss Tennessee. Upon graduation in ’74 she and her sisters sang on WSM TV & Radio for the Noon Show and Waking Crew. Lawrence taught physical education at Walton Ferry Elementary School during the 1974- 75 school year and was Miss Nashville in 1975. In 1976, she met and married Texan Clark Lawrence and worked with him in various ministries, including FCA (Fellowship of Christian Athletes), where she sang at events all over the country. She and her husband also worked for Joe Gibbs in founding the Youth for Tomorrow Boys Home.

Today she works in her second career selling real estate. Lawrence and her husband have three adult children, Chaz, Lacey and Kaley.

Ray Maddux, Stratford High School Class of 1969

Ray Maddux was an outstanding Stratford High School basketball player with countless titles and awards to show for his career. For two consecutive years he was named the Nashville Interscholastic League (NIL) Player of the Year, the Region V MVP and was an All-City and All-State athlete. He was a part of Stratford’s district, region, state and all tournament teams. In Maddux’s last year, he was chosen to be a part of the Dixie Dozen— a group of the top 12 high school players of the southeast. He still holds the record for most points scored in a game at Stratford (53 pts.) and was named the Nashville Banner Player of the Decade for the 60’s.

Maddux also made an unmistakable mark through his academic and leadership achievements. He held the title of Stratford High School Student Body President from 1968-1969 and was the President of Nashville Public Schools Inter-High Student Council in 1969. He went on to play for Vanderbilt University on a full scholarship, graduating four years later with a major in civil engineering and a minor in biomedical engineering. While playing basketball at Vanderbilt, Maddux set a freshman rebounding record, lettered for all four years and was on the All SEC Academic Team from 1972-1973.

Maddux now has a successful career in medical sales and strategic healthcare consulting and is the founder of The Health and Life Institute. He also served as chairman of the board for the Charles Davis Foundation from 1982 to 2015. He has been married to Annita Cline Maddux, his high school sweetheart, for 45 years (she is a SHS 1970 graduate). They have three children (Chris, Drew and Emily) and 14 grandchildren.

Hershel Moore, Goodlettsville High School Class of 1945

After more than 60 years on the sidelines, 88-year-old Hershel Moore is still relishing his role as a high school coach. Moore admits he was never a very good athlete, though he played basketball and football. He was a football walk-on at MTSU, and after graduating in 1951, he began his coaching career as an assistant at Isaac Litton High School.

Moore gained confidence as a coach and later became the head assistant at Litton. In 1958, he became a head coach for the first time at the new Glencliff High School, and later coached at Stratford and Beech High Schools. He also coached at Cumberland University, where his team led the nation in rushing in the NAIA (1995-1996, 1999 and 2001). Moore has been married to wife Tillie for 54 years and they have two sons (Tom and John). Both sons played football in high school and college, and they are both coaching at area high schools.

Vic Rouse, Pearl High School Class of 1961

Vic Rouse was instrumental in the Pearl High 1958, 1959 and 1960 National Championships that helped to name them as one of the best high school basketball teams in the south. Because of segregation, Pearl’s team may not have gotten the credit they deserved — but 54 straight wins and 22 black state titles over a 30-year span cannot be overlooked.

After high school, Rouse played basketball at Loyola University with his former teammate, Les Hunter. They continued to be a force to be reckoned with, on and off the court. Rouse was taking a full academic load of six courses during Loyola’s championship season. Rouse said he would study six days a week even with basketball games and practice.

On the court Rouse is remembered for a buzzer- beating shot, known as the “The Shot Heard ‘Round the Basketball World.” On March 23, 1963 in Louisville’s Freedom Hall, Loyola came back from a 15 point deficit in the last 10 minutes to tie the game with Cincinnati. In overtime, Rouse rebounded teammate Les Hunter’s shot to win the game and end Cincinnati’s two year run as NCAA Champions. The Chicago Tribune later ranked this comeback win as No. 7 on its 1998 list of the 150 Most Memorable Moments in Chicago Sports. Rouse helped cement that moment in history with his game winning shot and also earned himself a spot in the 1964 NBA season.

While he did not choose to join the NBA, Rouse found a different path to success after graduation. He moved on to work for a management consulting industrial relations firm with a focus on minority employee programs. At the age of 28, he founded his own company and continued to advocate for minority programs by writing articles on motivating socially and economically disadvantaged workers. Over the course of his life, Rouse earned a bachelor’s degree, two master’s degrees and a doctorate.Vic Rouse is survived by his wife, Brenda, and his two children, Victor and Deborah.

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